Andrew Charnley has been appointed as the new managing director at Assetz Capital.
Charnley joins the business having spent 28 years working in commercial lending across various asset classes and having undertaken a number of senior leadership roles, most recently at Together, a specialist lender, which offers short-term finance, auction finance, personal, commercial and buy-to-let mortgages, development funding and secured loans.
Going forward, Charnley will focus on Assetz Capital’s lending side of the business. He will oversee a team of 130, reporting directly to Stuart Law, Assetz Group CEO.
Assetz Capital has more than 40,000 registered private and institutional investors and has lent around £1.5bn to SMEs since 2013.
As the UK’s leading lender for the SME housebuilding sector, Assetz Capital’s investors have funded the creation of more than 6,800 homes since 2013, 1 in 12 of all SME built new homes in recent years.
Assetz Capital is part of the Assetz Group of financial and property services companies, which also includes the UK’s only crowdfunding platform for social impact property projects, Assetz Exchange.
In 2022 the group restated its broader purpose and strategy; to provide innovative new models for private investors and institutions to invest in diversified property portfolios that deliver significant social benefits.
To date investors across all Assetz Group platforms have funded £2.5bn of new housing, supported 1,110 SMEs and financed 16,000 new homes, while supporting a range of housebuilders, SMEs, housing associations and charities.
As part of its ambitious strategy Assetz Group is targeting hitting £1bn+ of SME housebuilder lending per annum, and a longer-term goal to provide a quarter of all new builds constructed by SMEs in the UK. These ambitions will be largely delivered through Assetz Capital, a specialist in this market.
This strategy received major backing in March as Swedish lender Aros Kapital extended its partnership with Assetz Capital to provide over £1bn of lending for UK SMEs.
Charnley said: “Assetz Capital has consistently been a market leader in the UK alternative lending sector, providing outstanding returns to investors for over 20 years, while supporting thousands of UK SMEs and financing billions of pounds worth of new housing.
“The business’s pioneering approach, marrying strong returns with a focus on sustainability and social impact, while creating more flexible and accessible platforms for real estate investment has been a truly innovative market force for institutional and retail investors alike.
“At the same time, Assetz Capital has provided a desperately needed alternative to high street lending which has underserved crucial economic sectors over recent decades.
“I am excited to join the team at a critical moment in Assetz Capital’s growth story, as we look to continue to drive market share and innovation, consolidating our position as one of the UK’s top specialist lenders and a business which is growing ever more ambitious in terms of the impact it makes on society.”
Stuart Law, CEO of the Assetz Group, added: “Continuing to attract talented industry experts like Andrew to Assetz Capital is a sign of our success over the last 20 years and a show of faith in our future.
“We have emphatically re-stated our purpose this year at group level, aiming to drive ever increasing social impact, especially through funding house builders to tackle our nation’s housing crisis and growing our support for the care sector.
“Andrew will play a huge role in taking Assetz Capital to the next level of growth as we look to continue delivering credible returns to our retail and institutional investors, and set our sights on growing our influence in the wider housing market.
“Specifically, we have set our long-term sights on revitalising our nation’s SME housebuilding sector by funding as much as a quarter of all SME built homes in time.
“Andrew will lead our efforts across Assetz Capital, whether that’s developing and delivering new bespoke financial products for our borrowers, or continuing to pioneer new ways for private and institutional investors to invest in diversified real estate portfolios with more flexibility, less risk, and the ability to see their capital make a tangible social impact.”
